Better Off Alone
by Watson Baker
Summary: A fresh start in an old neighborhood was not something Cat wanted. Her life was already threatened to be turned upside-down from the move out of the city. She wasn't prepared for the crazy that had been following her family for years prior. Ghosts of the past won't stay buried, and a looming threat is poised to threaten the lives of everyone on earth.


The sky seemed so gray and lifeless as I blinked and stared outside the window. The unfamiliar room caused a feeling of unrest to settle in my stomach. Even though all my personal belongings had been careful placed and organized, nothing felt like home yet compared to growing up in the busiest part of the city. I debated staying snuggled into my bed for the rest of the day instead of heading off to the new skool, but a crash against the bedroom door prevent me from getting any more sleep. Angry for the abuse so early in the morning, I slowly sat up and started to move to go open the door only to be tackled by the green menace that plagued the household since the dawn of time itself.

"WAKEY WAKEY EGG AND BAKEY!" the green robot dog screamed into my ear while trying to rub its disgusting head on my face. With practiced ease it was easy to manhandle the bundle of fluff and snatch my glasses from the dresser before making my way downstairs.

Mom was humming to herself and getting some eggs ready for the plates, while my dad was surprisingly at the table with a tablet in one hand and toast in the other. I let out a little cough and watched as both of them sprung to life and turned to see me in the kitchen.

"Cat! You're actually up on time today. Gir must of been impatient this morning… Go get ready and I'll have breakfast done in a minute."

"Yeah mom fine sure whatever stupid robot…" I grumbled as I turned around and headed back upstairs, knowing my mom hated it when I trailed off in a rage.

I had no idea why dad created that stupid robot dog to act so stupid. Some theories that had come up when I was younger was that robot dogs were easier to take care of than normal ones, but that flew out the window pretty fast as I witness the tiny menace almost eat everything in our fridge and hog the TV too many times to count. I tied my dark blue hair in a ponytail and quickly threw on something easy to wear that wasn't my usual tattered hoodie. When everything was in order I grabbed what I needed and started my way down the stairs, only to pause when I heard my parent's muffled voices from the dining room.

"-and you know it's hard for her. Maybe we should have waited till she was older to move."

"Please Eva, you have to understand. The company really wants me back to oversee the latest breakthroughs. We even agreed that I'd be able to take this job and spend more time at home so I can be there for Cat. This is really important. My dad was always there for me while I was growing up and I want to be there for her."

"I know dear, I just worry she won't make any friends. I remember when you were all alone back at that dreadful Skool."

"If it wasn't for that 'dreadful' Skool I wouldn't of met you my lovely flower," he softly whispered. Dad only got this way when he was trying to distract my mom from talking about serious stuff. Apparently it worked if the giggling was any indicator.

"Come here and give me a good morning hug you big softy."

Having heard enough, I loudly made her back back down the rest of the stairs and out the door before my parents or Gir could say anything else to me. Thankfully I already knew my way to the bus.

XXX

The closest bus stop to my house looked trashed and ugly compared to the rest of the fairly clean neighborhood. As I approached I spotted a nerdy looking kid with crazy messy hair sitting on the curb leading to the road typing furiously on his laptop, eyes glued to the screen and not even acknowledging me as I made my way towards him. With a kick from my heavy combat boots, the kid blinked up owlishly from his screen at looked at me with a questioning frown.

"Hey, you going to the Skool?" I asked stiffly while trying to skim over the file names on his screen. I was always a curious and sneaky devil, always a bit too curious about other people's business for my own good.

"Oh, y-yeah, I'm going. I'm gonna b-be part of the new school system. Are you too?"

"Pretty much. I just moved here from the City. What you working on anyways?"

"Oh this?" He asked while gesturing to the rotating models of what looked like horrific demon creatures. "Nothing much, except well I like to work on solving the mysteries of the world. I love debunking supernatural stories and finding proof of the real explanation for why these strange things happen."

I raised an eyebrow at him and shook my head. "Oh gosh, that's lame. I thought you were smarter than the rest of this washed up town, but you're just crazy."

Guess it was time to shut down and start ignoring the crazy, but his voice took on a different tone as he closed his laptop in a hurry and faced me fully. "No no no! I don't really believe in fairies and dragons and monsters and aliens. I think there's always stuff that can be explained with the right tools and research. It's… complicated."

He sounded a bit like dad with his explanation, softening me up a bit. I need to make at least one friend here or my mom will start being clingy again.

"Oh… ehh sounds like you're not completely crazy. Give me your name before the bus gets here."

With a bright smile, the nerdy kid stood up hastily and held a hand out for me to shake.

"Thanks for hearing me out, not many people actually do. My names Brad Galavan."

As I sat up from where I had been sitting, I realized that Brad was about two heads taller than me. With a firm grip I took his hand and shook it quickly.

"M'names Cathrine Membrane, but people just call me Cat."

"Wait… Membrane… why does that sound familiar. Didn't your family make the legendary Super Toast?"

"Apparently my great grandfather did, yeah."

"Sweet! I loved researching the science behind the toast that got the future rolling towards progress. If your family has some old research notes I'd love to see them. Can you check for me? Pretty please with a cherry on top?"

"Yeah sure whatever…" I started to grumbled as my social limit was already maxed out from talking to the hyper tall kid.

His eyes lit up and his nervousness disappeared completely as he shoved his laptop back into his backpack. The bus arrived as he he kept chatting away in my ear. We settled for the far corner of the bus and fell into the back seats as the bus rocketed away without caring if everyone was ready.

XXX

The Skool was a rundown dirty mess that didn't really fit with the rest of the area. Despite its crumbling state everyone still filtered through the doors and into the rooms. I tailed behind Brad as we got to the classroom of the infamous Ms. Bitters. Along the way Brad was still talking my ear off in an attempt to calm his nerves.

"-I also did this research on the teacher. Apparently either this Ms. Bitters is a relative of the original or its the same Ms. Bitters who never changes or ages. I wonder if they just have a similar family trait that makes them all look old and angry so I'll be hitting the library later and-"

"Shut up… we're here." I stated as I punched him in the arm.

As we made our way into the classroom and stood awkwardly at the front, another student pushed his way through the door and marched up to the front. I had to do double take of the strange kid as I realized he didn't have any ears or nose. His skin was extremely pale with a hint of green, and he seemed to be fiddling the edges of his black coat with uncertainty as he looked around the room. Noticing his uneasiness, I attempted to reach over and tap the mystery boy on his shoulder, but the teacher somehow materializing like an evil phantom from behind the desk causing me to freeze in fear. Maybe I should have listened to Brad a bit more about Ms. Bitters.

"Okay class, we have three new students joining our miserable ranks so pay attention before I throw you into the underground classroom for the rest of the day. Introduce yourselves before I lose my patience."

Brad stepped up first, hands deep in his pants pockets and eyes scanning the room. "H-hey.. I mean hi… I mean… ugh I'm Brad… pleased to meet you all?"

"Name's Cat. Sup," I stated blankly and waved to the unfortunate souls.

"Yes hello fellow normal worms of earth. It is I, Zeek! I will reign down on this Skool and you will all tremble at my advanced intellect!" He declared, making me roll my eyes. I knew not too many people were normal in this town but I was starting to be afraid of losing braincells just from being in close proximity to the amount of stupid radiating from the occupants of this room.

"Sit down all of you and stare blankly at the chalkboard while I go look for something for you miserable children to do."

When the teacher departed, the strange kid named Zeek immediately got up from his chair and made his way to the front of my dirty desk. His gigantic dark brown eyes were even more pronounced up close, with pupils made bigger from the ridiculous pair of large circular glasses somehow perched on his face. With a glance I realized the ends of the glasses were taped to the sides of his head. When the silence got too much for me to bare I finally acknowledged him in hopes he would go away soon.

"What do you want?"

"I want to get to know the fools who dare to come in the same day as… ZEEK!"

"I think you're more of a fool than me for shouting in my face while I'm not in a good mood."

"Hmm, the Cat-human is a bit scary." Wait, why did he add human at the end of my name. This kid seemed to have more than a few screws loose in his brain.

Brad came up to the two of us and attempted to hold out a hand for the new strange kid to shake. "Hi, I'm Brad b-but you already knew that. I have so many questions for you I hope you don't mind. Why don't you have any ears or nose? Why do you only have three fingers? Why…"

"SHUT UP big headed worm-monster and do not touch me with your FILTHY hands!" He hissed before storming away back to his desk on the far left of the room.

"B-but… I just wanted to know… wait a minute! My head's not big!" Brad shouted at Zeek in embarrassment. For some strange reason it caused the loud kid to stop walking and look back at the poor sniffling victim.

"What was your name again?" Zeek asked, a strange emotion reflected through those comically wide and expressive eyes.

"Uh… It's Bradley Galavan… I mean Brad… yeah Brad…"

"It's a skin condition, runs in Zeek's family unit." The rest of the class was strangely silent, but air seemed less electrified than before.

XXX

I had finally made it back home after saying goodbye to Brad. As the only person I seemed to tolerate in this disgusting location, we decided to be friends and try to hang out after skool hours. The weekends were going to be at least a bit more interesting than playing video games in my room or helping in the downstairs lab. As I shuffled through the front door I noticed that it was my dad who was greeting instead of my mom. He leaned down and patted me on the head with a small smile on my face.

"Hello Kitty Cat! How was your first day of school?"

I shrugged and patted him back on the head, purposely trying to squish the hair piece on his head that refused to go down. Dad chuckled and leaned back up so he could walk to the living room.

"I hope you can tell me or your mother more about it. Did you at least make any new friends?"

"Yeah I was at least to manage that much. This older kid named Brad. Also met this loud kid named Zeek but I'm not sure he's a friend yet."

"Wait a second… do you mean Bradley Galavan?!" Her dad exclaimed while flopping down on the couch to relax. "What a crazy coincidence. The Galavans are actually family from my side of the family. Of all the people you make friends with first it's one of your cousins. Let Brad know he's welcome over along with the rest of his family if they want to say hi. I wonder if my Aunt Gaz still lives with them…"

Well, that suddenly made a bit more sense. It was a bit odd how similar Brad and my dad looked. The only real differences were the hair styles and the lack of glasses on the younger's face.

Before I could get to the stairs the front door started banging loud enough to ring my ears. I spun around before my dad could get up from the couch and opened the door to come face to face with the crazy kid Zeek. I blinked and stared up at him with an annoyed scowl.

"What are you doing here? Did you stalk me?"

Zeek actually tilted his head in a confused manner while trying to look behind me into the house. "Zeek did no such thing. What are YOU doing here at this home?"

"Uh… I live here."

"Eh?"

"What don't you understand?" I growled angrily.

"Well it doesn't matter," he declared with a wave of his gloved hand. "I'm actually here because I heard the Dom-human has returned. I wanted to see him."

"Dom-human…wait do you mean m-"

"Cat? Who's at the door?" Dad called over from his corner of the couch, leaning over to try and look past my shoulder.

"It's that weird kid Zeek from school. He's looking for someone named Dom."

Dad seemed to waste no time and hastily got up from the couch to run over to the front door. When he came in view of Zeek his franticness slowed and shock seemed to take over his face. I had no idea what was going on but both guys were staring in complete surprise at the other. Half of me wanted to run into my room and get away from the strange staring match, and the other half wanted to watch and see what came out of this interaction. My curious side won over and I hung around as my dad started to speak.

"Um, if you don't mind me asking, are you related to someone named Zim?"

"Erm, yes… and are you related to the Dom-human?"

That question caused another round of uncomfortable silence. I kicked my dad in the leg to shake him out of his thoughts. I hadn't seem him this bad since Gir had eaten all of his research notes for the world peace convention.

"Actually, I am the Dom-human… I mean I'm Dom. Dominic Membrane. What are you doing here? Are you living with Zim?"

"Dad, who's Zim?" I asked, hating how out of the loop I was. Dad looked down at me and gave a really sad smile while twiddling his fingers. "Uncle Zim was a friend of the family. He actually took care of me sometimes while I was growing up. We always had so much fun. I don't remember exactly when but around the time I was in the middle of high skool he moved away. I wanted to reach out and stay in contact but I couldn't find him."

"You still won't," Zeek added, shuffling in place awkwardly. "Zim does not exist anymore. It's only Zeek."

At the news, I watched as Dad's eyes glazed over at the news. I noticed that Zeek had moved forward as if to comfort my dad, which I found hilarious. I always knew my dad was a big baby, but I never realized he was that much of a mess. No wonder my mom was the head of the family when it came to adult stuff. In the end Zeek never worked up the courage to do anything and Dad recovered with a sniffle while giving one of his signature friendly smiles.

"Well Zeek, you're welcome to come visit whenever you want. Don't be a stranger. We're all practically family. Feel free to keep calling me Dom if you want. Only my coworkers and my students call me Mr. Membrane anyways."

"Okay, that works for Zeek." He nodded, causing his glasses to come a bit loose from the tape. I laughed as he tried to save them from completely falling off his face, earning me a glare from the noseless boy. "Also, I would like to request the SIR unit Gir for assistance."

"Why do you want our dog?" I demanded while blocking the door. Causing my dad stress was bad enough, but taking the only thing that kept him smiling on his darkest days was crossing the line. Zeek glared at me and crossed his arms in annoyance.

"Foolish earth child. He was MINE first. I'll bring him back tomorrow. I demand his help now. It's VERY IMPORTANT!"

His voice could probably shatter glass if given enough time and exposure to his grating voice. I wondered if that was also a family trait because dad just laughed and walked over to the door that led to the back yard.

"Cat it's fine. Zim was actually the owner first. Think if it as a house visit, or sharing time. Gir! Get out of the flower bed and come meet someone!"

Right on cue the robot dog ran through the living room covered in wet dirt and pushed past me to face Zeek.

"Who's you?" Gir asked with a tilt of his head.

"Umm… hmm how does Zeek explain this…" he mumbled while his eyes moved from me, dad and back to Gir. "… I'm a family unit of your old supreme master Zim and I come to-"

"YOU KNOW MA MASTER!? I HAVEN"T SEEN MASTER IN FOREVA!" Gir wailed while waving his nubby arms around. Zeek flinched at the volume, making me wonder how we was even hearing anything without ears, and gestured outside of the house.

"Yes yes, come with me and Zeek will inform you on everything."

"Hold up," I spoke quickly before he had a chance to escape.

"Eh?"

"Come with Brad and I this weekend?" I asked. "We can all hang out and stuff…"

I wanted to know more about this kid who suddenly barged into our lives. What I wanted to mostly do was make sure he would return Gir to us. It was a bonus to figure out the living breathing and shouting personification of a mystery estranged family member. Hopefully things wouldn't be as boring in this neighborhood as I thought.

"Yes yes fine fine. I will agree to your request only because it amuses me. Goodbye Dom-human and Cat-human. I SHALL RETURN EVENTUALLY!" With that parting shout, Zeek and Gir made their way down the street and out of sight.

Dad sighed and closed the door, rubbing his temples as he made his way back to the couch. I moved to sit on the couch with him and gave him a big hug, knowing he wasn't feeling well after this entire ordeal. We didn't even turn the TV on. Dad just hugged me back as we sat in silence. It was rarely quiet in the house because of Gir. Even though I didn't like the dog that much I still appreciated his company throughout my life.

"Hey… dad?" I asked after a while. "Do you wanna talk about your Uncle Zim to me?"

He gave a hearty laugh and sat me on his lap at the question. "If thats okay with you sweetie. I'm just really shocked. I didn't think Uncle Zim would even have a kid, let alone one that looks like he's fighting against his skin condition. You probably noticed when you met him."

"Yeah… he's missing fingers and a nose and ears…"

"It's not just that. Uncle Zim used to have really green skin. Looks like that condition is getting a bit better. Zeek looks healthier than Zim was. Actually I might have some pictures down in the lab."

While he was gone, thoughts started assaulting my head. I started to wonder what this was going to mean for our family. Getting in touch with old family members seemed a bit strange, but this whole Zeek thing was creeping me out a bit as well. Everything felt like one really bad episode that I couldn't get out of. I wondered if any other thirteen year olds got into these kinds of situations.

Dad emerged from the lab with a pretty dusty book. We spent the rest of the evening looking through my dad's old baby photos. The first picture seemed to be of him and a toddler version of my dad in a cardboard box that messily had the word 'spaceship' written on the side. Gir was balancing the box on his head, making it feel like the box was hovering off the ground. He seemed to be telling the truth about the skin condition being a hereditary thing. The bright green skinned short man was sitting behind my younger dad with a scowl plastered on his face. His eyes seemed a lighter brown and his hair was a bit curlier in the front and longer in the back.

Despite all the mean looks Uncle Zim seemed to be giving dad in almost every picture they shared, they seemed to at least enjoy each others company. The stories were also surprisingly entertaining, mostly because my dad was usually awful at telling bedtime stories when I was younger.

"This one time Uncle Zim convinced my dad to take us to a monster truck show for my tenth birthday. I barely remember the show being really lame before Uncle Zim used some sort of device he had in his backpack to remote control one of the trucks. He taught me the controls and I got to drive it around the whole track. Dad was furious and scolded us for causing chaos… But it was the best birthday I ever had in my life."

"Wait a second, how did he remote control a real car?"

"Uncle Zim was a genius, even more so than my dad. He was always pulling a bunch of gadgets and crazy toys from his backpack. Sometimes they got me in trouble but when I was your age I was having too much fun to really care."

By the time Mom had come home with the groceries we had finished going through most of the pictures. Dad got up from the couch and went to kiss my mom on the cheek and help her get stuff into the fridge.

Before I closed the book I went back to the very first page of the book and saw that behind the rocket ship picture were a couple of older photos. I carefully lifted the first picture out of the holder and removed the new ones so I could look at them better.

The first picture was a family photo. My grandpa and a scary woman I didn't recognize stood side by side. Standing in front of them holding a very small baby version of my dad was Uncle Zim. Next to Zim was the seemingly immortal robot dog Gir playing with my dad's baby feet and a floating purple moose playing with one of my dad's hands. The only person who seemed to be looking at the camera was my dad. The scary lady was looking down at what seemed to be an older model of the Gameslave. Uncle Zim and Grandpa were glaring at each other with annoyance, not seeming to notice that the picture had been taken. I flipped the picture over and read the oddly nice hand righting on the back.

_From Left to Right: Dibert Membrane, Gazlene Membrane, Minimoose, ZIM, Dominic Membrane, GIR_

Dad was right, Uncle Zim must of really been family back then, along with my Aunt Gazlene who I remember being mentioned once during one of my mom and dad's arguments. A thought suddenly struck me. If this was a family photo around the time my dad was born, why wasn't my grandma in the picture? I had an uneasy feeling in the pit of my stomach as I moved the photo away to the second one.

The last photo was confusing. Two men in lab coats, who I realized were Dibert and Zim, were at a table filled with beakers of glowing substances and papers littered all around the area. My Grandpa was fast asleep and Uncle Zim was poking him in the head with a sharp finger in boredom. I turned over the picture hoping to get more answers and was greeted with messier handwriting than the last photo.

_Dib and Zim: 3 Days to Dominic_

I closed the book and went to dinner, barely eating as questions kept assaulting my head. Sometimes I felt like I was too smart for my age, but right now I felt like the most stupid person on the planet. Something big was hitting me in the face but I couldn't figure it out. Dad asked me what was wrong, while mom told him to leave me alone in case I was overwhelmed with the first day of school. After thanking them for the meal I gathered my stuff and made my way to my room, keeping the two pictures safely tucked into the binder of my notebook.

I had some thinking to do.


End file.
